


A Journey Through the Rocket Empire

by NiwaHikari



Category: Pocket Monsters | Pokemon - All Media Types, Pocket Monsters: Gold & Silver & Crystal | Pokemon Gold Silver Crystal Versions
Genre: Realistic Pokemon AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-29
Updated: 2020-10-06
Packaged: 2021-03-07 16:13:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26720455
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NiwaHikari/pseuds/NiwaHikari
Summary: Sixty-two years after Red took the title of Champion at the Indigo Plateau and thirty-six years after Team Rocket overthrew the Elite Four, this is a world where the Rocket Elites rule and the commoners are little more than cheap labour, banned from owning Pokémon.So when Tohru answers a call from her long-absent mother to join the Resistance, she is forced to travel off-route to avoid running into the Rocket Guard. And the middle of the forest is the last place she’d expected to run into an Elite girl who embodies everything Tohru hates. But when the dangers of the wild test them both to their limits, it may be that they’ve got more to learn from each other than they think.





	1. Chapter 1

Goldenrod City was nothing like Tohru had imagined. The entire city was made up of towering skyscrapers that extended out like the claws of a predator, daring the sky and clouds to come close enough to maim. From where Tohru was standing on the red-brick main thoroughfare with the North Gate a few metres behind her, there wasn’t a single building less than fifty storeys tall and she had to crane her neck and squint at the bright morning sky to see the tops of them.

Sure, Olivine City had its fair share of high rises, built as it was on the narrow strip of land between the sea and the steep mountains that surrounded the valley of Route Thirty-Nine, and there were a few skyscrapers in the business district near the bay. But none of them competed for attention as much as the ones here in Goldenrod. Some even looked like they were gilded in gold, for goodness' sake. Tohru wondered if that was just in tribute to the city's name, or if it was actually to show off the sheer wealth of those who occupied them. The thought that it could be the latter brought a taste of bile to Tohru's throat that she quickly swallowed. No use getting angry now when she had more important things to focus on.

Like finding out where she was supposed to be going.

Bending down to pretend at fixing the laces on her trainers, Tohru checked behind her to make sure no one was paying her too much attention. Once she was satisfied that all the guards and travellers at the gate were too preoccupied and self-absorbed to notice her, she moved over to the side of the road to stand in front of a small café rummaged around in the inside pocket of her hoodie, sewn in specially for the occasion. She took out a map, careful not to accidentally pull out the fake papers that had got her into the city along with it, and opened it up in front of her. ‘Map’ was overstating it a little — it was more of a diagram, roughly sketched by the same person who’d given her the forged travel documents, with a few key landmarks drawn on and only the roads relevant to getting Tohru to her destination, and all instructions written in a code that her grandma had helped her decipher. She’d spent weeks poring over it on her way here, but it made much more sense looking at it now she was standing in the city itself. The South-East quarter was where she was headed, so her left turn should be a way further down the main thoroughfare.

Like Olivine, Goldenrod was a port city, with the harbour to the west and mountains to the east. The only difference was that Goldenrod sat in a large basin that had allowed more room for growth in its earlier years. Tohru remembered from one of her Grandma's many lessons (because "commoner or not, you should know the history of where you live") that the port was a relatively recent development and that the Rocket Empire had cleared the bay of underlying rock to make way for the trade ships that would provide the much-needed foundations for the Empire's rise to power.

So, what had once been a fairly large city that had grown on the back of investment from Kanto after the war with them over seventy years ago was now a gigantic, sprawling metropolis whose rapid expansion had engulfed part of Route Thirty-Five to the north and most of Route Thirty-Four to the south. Apparently they'd even tried to cut down the Ilex Forest to make a clear route to Azalea Town, but had failed for reasons unclear - Grandma said you could ask ten different people and hear ten different answers as to why they'd had to give up and build a road around the north of the forest through the mountains instead. Some of the more outlandish accounts claimed that the mythical Pokémon guarding the forest had wreaked havoc on all attempts to bring in machinery to clear the trees, or that the vegetation had kept on regrowing to its original height and density overnight, but Tohru was sceptical. Not that she had any better theories herself, but it was definitely not either of those.

Tohru looked up from her map and took in the road ahead of her. At about thirty metres wide, the street gave people plenty of space to stroll at their idle leisure despite the ridiculous number of them. That in itself surprised Tohru — it was just before ten in the morning according the Radio Tower with its dark iron frame standing stark against the bright sunshine colours of the other buildings. Why were so many people out shopping this early in the morning? Did they really have nothing better to do? As Rocket Elites they probably didn’t, and apparently every single one in Johto and maybe even Kanto was here. Or maybe there were just way more Elites in the Rocket Empire than Tohru had ever imagined, and this street was just the only place worth going to. She wouldn’t be surprised. Lined with more boutiques, cafés, restaurants and flower shops that Tohru cared to count, the street was much wider than any in Olivine and yet only a narrow strip in the middle was given over to Pokémon traffic, be it carts drawn by huge Tauros or the odd Elite riding elegant Rapidash at a trot, along with the occasional motor vehicle. The rest of the road was reserved for pedestrians, Elites in their sleek designer clothing and flaunted riches. A few had even brought along their commoner servants, uniformed in the colours of their house, to carry their shopping. Basically, anyone with enough money to enjoy the up-market retail on offer along here was out for the day, and then some. Tohru, in her trainers, baggy patched-up jeans, black hoodie and old rucksack, stuck out like a Miltank in a field of Mareep. The sooner she found where she needed to go, the better.

Tohru put her head down and walked, hands loose at her sides. She wove deftly through the throng — the markets in Olivine had given her enough practice at doing that — and kept an eye on the people around her, but those that noticed her gave her a wide berth, hands shifting to cover their pockets and handbags. As _if_ Tohru was here to steal from them. But anyway, the feeling was mutual and she kept her distance from them as well. She had no desire to make physical contact with any of them if she could avoid it. Their perfume stank, to say the least.

But the crowd thickened and Tohru was forced to jostle for space, much to her irritation and, hopefully, that of those around her. Some pockets hung open almost invitingly and Tohru imagined reaching out and slipping out the wallet of one Elite Lady’s jacket, which from this close would be so easy. Judging from her smooth hair that hung down her back and the shine of her low-heeled shoes, there was no way she needed the money anyway. But she stayed her hand. She wasn’t as practised as some of the kids she’d seen in Olivine pinching purses and would probably get caught if she tried. Not a risk worth taking today, and in a city she didn’t know.

Lost in thought, Tohru didn’t see the woman stop and walked straight into the back of her. The crowd flowed around them and Tohru looked up to utter a reluctant apology before moving on quickly, but the word caught in her throat when she saw the woman’s expression of open disgust and hatred, one that only an Elite would give a commoner. Tohru had been on the sharp end of that look so many times back on the kelp farm in Olivine, yet she'd never got used to it. Some people cowered and got scared when it happened to them, but Tohru couldn’t understand that. Each time someone looked at her like this, the rage that she usually kept at an almost imperceptibly low burn threatened to boil over and lash out. Because no one, _no one,_ had the right to treat her like that.

“Watch it,” the woman snarled, a menacing sound like a Persian about to attack. Tohru inhaled slowly, jaw clenched to the point of aching, and averted her gaze downward.

 _Just let them see what they want to see and then move on,_ she told herself, her Grandpa’s voice echoing in her ears.

"I apologise, my lady," Tohru said as she bowed as deeply as she could in the thick crowd. Tohru went through the motions of the ritual, voice mechanical and just about even to cover up her anger. It was times like this when she couldn’t wait to make the whole Rocket Elite sorry for what they had done, what they continued to do to commoners like her. Every single one of them would pay, and not with money.

Except, the woman wasn't an Elite. Tohru did a double take, but from her position bowing she could see no Poké Balls on the woman's belt, and hadn't noticed any others on her jacket. There wasn't even a little Aipom or anything sitting on her shoulder. This woman, well-heeled though she seemed, was a commoner. Like Tohru.

 _Bitch. Do you seriously think you're so much like them that you can act like this to one of your own? Do you really think they’ll ever accept you?_ Tohru’s jaw and fists tightened so hard that something could have broken, and it was all she could do to keep herself from grabbing the woman's collar and screaming at her. _Why the hell do you want to be like them?_

But she said nothing. Commoner or not, this woman clearly had enough clout to bring the Guard down on Tohru.

"Get out of my sight," the woman said. And Tohru did, eyes still cast down. She itched to turn back and punch the woman in the face, but she wouldn't. She didn't even look over her shoulder. Starting today, she had bigger fish to fry than this woman. She’d probably even stopped deliberately so that Tohru would walk into her, just to have a chance to remind herself that she was better than a commoner. Well, that woman had to have friends that were like her. And they would all go down with the rest of the Elites whose arses they were licking.

Tohru continued to fume as she walked down the street, now more aware of the mixture of people here. There were both elites and commoners, close but not quite touching, and the only difference between some of them was the lack of Poké Balls. Elites always kept them on show as a symbol of their status if they didn’t have a Pokémon out walking at the heel of their well-polished yet completely impractical shoes or riding on a shoulder, whereas commoners didn’t have that privilege, banned as they were from owning Pokémon at all. Anyone without visible evidence of Pokémon ownership was a commoner, and any commoner found to be in possession of so much as a Sentret was liable for imprisonment or worse.

Unconsciously, Tohru’s hands found their way into her pockets of her loose jeans, where her right curled protectively around what she kept hidden in another secret pocket sewn for the purpose. No, she needed to avoid doing anything that would attract the attention of the Rocket Guard, no matter how much every single person on this street deserved to have their teeth knocked out and more.

Without warning, Tohru's stomach rumbled in complaint at the lack of breakfast. It had taken almost two weeks to get here from Olivine, during which time Tohru had survived first on what little food she had managed to pack and then on whatever she had managed to get hold of in the wild. Digging her other hand into her other pocket, she estimated the amount of change she had left and wondered if it would be enough to get something to eat in this city.

Even, or especially, on this main thoroughfare with its fancy shops and fancier Elites, a couple of street urchins scuttled through the crowds, fingers ready to relieve anyone of anything they weren't being careful to keep a firm hold of. Tohru supposed that, from the outside, the only difference between her and them was a few years senior to her advantage. Other than that, with her clothes muddy from travelling on foot and scruffed up from life in general, she knew she looked just the same as these children trying their luck with the pockets of their social superiors. Nonetheless, just like every Elite in the crowd who had no desire to be robbed and was sharp enough to have noticed the pickpockets, Tohru shoved her hands deeper into her pockets again. All the while keeping a curious eye on the two children with their deft hands, so much more skilled than her own.

Though apparently not skilled enough. Perhaps they had been on a roll that morning and had told themselves just one more pocket and then we go, or perhaps they hadn't taken anything for days and were getting desperate. The reason didn't matter. 

It seemed to happen in slow motion. One of the kids, no more than twelve years old, reached out to take a wallet poking out the jacket pocket of an Elite with more weight on him than a whole family of commoners combined. He might even have been too slow to notice the little hand in his jacket had he not turned at that exact moment to eye the shops to his right, the same side the urchin was trying to steal his wallet from. The girl tried to snap her hand back and disappear into the crowd, but she wasn’t quick enough: large though he was, the Rocket Lord was fast and grabbed her hand in a vice-like grip. Tohru briefly wondered if the man trained with Fighting types to get reactions as quick as that, but her curiosity instantly turned to shock and then horror when he threw the girl to the ground with a yell, cursing the “worthless commoner scum” she was and kicked her in the ribs with a sickening _crack_. The child screamed out in pain as the man shouted back, punctuating each point with another kick. The man could kill the child without hesitation or regret, and no one would care.

 _Bastard_ , she thought, fists now out of their pockets and tightening at her sides. Maybe she could help… Could she stop him? Save the girl’s life? Too many commoners died at the hands of Elites as it was without the poor girl’s body being added to the pile.

The crowd had parted to avoid the scene, with Tohru among the few who had stopped to watch — the plight of a commoner child, a street urchin no less, was beneath the concern of most here. In just a few steps Tohru could get between the girl on the floor and the Lord towering over her, she could see it in her mind’s eye how she would grab his thigh and put him off balance to throw him to the ground. Her legs ached to move, her hands twitched at her sides, yet she remained glued to the spot, body frozen. What was wrong with her? Hadn’t she been training her whole life for this kind of thing?

But no one else was intervening… Well, no one in their right mind would. After all, no one cared about the life of a street urchin. They probably all thought the city would be better with one less. And what would Tohru gain from stepping up? Looking at the size of the man, there was no way he wouldn’t just immediately overcome her and add her own limp body to that of the would-be pickpocket. Then she would have thrown away the opportunity that brought her to this city in the first place. But what would it say about her if she did nothing?

 _I’m a coward,_ she realised with hot shame spreading up her neck to her face. She was a selfish coward. That was the real reason she did nothing.

The Rocket Lord stepped back from his tirade with a snarl, leaving the girl lying limp but still moving on the red-brick pavement. Tohru was about to force a foot forward to help when he unclipped an Ultra Ball from his belt. A Primape appeared in a flash of incandescent light, tan limbs sticking out from its round body of shaggy white fur. Tohru had only ever seen these things in pictures, and she was both surprised and unsurprised by how much it reeked of unwashed fur even from a few metres' distance.

It sniffed the air a moment before turning its narrow eyes on the girl at its feet. Then, the command barely past its trainer’s lips, it attacked.

If the Rocket Lord’s assault of the girl had been out of proportion with her crime, what the Primeape did was in another world entirely. With nightmare-inducing screeches of rage, it pounded her body with its fingerless fists, pulled at her so as to dislocate her limbs and tear off fingers and even a hand. The parts lay discarded at the feet of the uncaring passersby, who just stepped over them with indifference.

And still, all Tohru did was stare and wince. She should intervene, sneak up on the creature with the knife in her boot. It would be an impossible fight given how old and well-trained the Primeape looked, but it would be the right thing to do. She had to.

But she couldn’t move.

It was only when the Primeape started using its teeth to tear at the girl’s flesh that the Lord recalled it back to it’s Poké Ball. With another grunt about the filth of the common class, he turned away and melted into the crowd.

Tohru stood rooted to the spot, feeling like there was a gaping hole where her stomach used to be, as the girl's accomplice from before scuttled over. Still frozen, even as the onlookers began to move on, Tohru watched with her breath held while the child nudged and shook her friend. But the girl’s lips were blue and spattered with red, her body bent at angles that should be impossible, blood dying the red bricks of the road a darker, more sinister shade, and her head rolled as her eyes stared unseeing at the passing crowd. Dead.

_Because of me. Because I did nothing. I let him kill her._

Tohru’s throat constricted unbearably and her eyes prickled as she stared, unblinking at the tiny funeral unfolding before her. A life barely lived, gone at the whim of a Rocket Lord with nothing better to do than to beat up helpless children. Someone in the crowd bumped into Tohru from behind as the circle around the scene closed, and she went to turn and snarl at whoever had knocked her, but they were already gone. The flow of people took her past the body as the remaining girl gave up and began to stand, less tall than before. Tohru averted her gaze. But even as she walked by, she imagined those sightless eyes staring after her, accusing and blaming.

_“You did this.”_

Tohru picked up her pace, both arms held across herself in a hug that held no warmth or comfort. Part of her knew that there was nothing she could have done and lived to tell about, not this time at least. But she swore then and there that it would be the last time she looked on helplessly. Next time, she would be stronger and she would act. Next time, the body on the floor wouldn’t be that of a commoner, but of an Elite.

Because today, Tohru was joining the Resistance.

~*~

After following the flow of people — Elites and wannabes, every single one a potential murderer with a mark on their back — for a little while longer, scents of cooking wafted around Tohru on the light breeze, and when she blinked herself from her thoughts she realised she’d ended up in a market. The crowd funnelled down the narrow walkways between stalls with merchants selling their wares — everything from artistically painted plates and bowls to Krabby legs and battered Octillery. Tohru’s stomach rumbled loudly at the seafood, but knew that the coins in her pocket wouldn't cover the prices they were asking here. This was a place for Elites to spend their money, and even the air tasted expensive.

Just as she was about to turn and leave the market, she came across a stall selling more varieties of bread and baked goods than she had ever thought possible and, despite the horror she had just witnessed, the pain of hunger in her stomach seemed to increase tenfold. Some of the markets in the more affluent parts of Olivine had exotic bread stalls on occasion, but even there the most curious thing had been a Kalosian Pomeg tarte. This stall had all the familiar melon pan and other sweet breads that were popular in Johto and Kanto, though they were relegated to the corner to make space for everything else like Unovan doughnuts and cheesecakes, Alolan deep-fried mochi, an array of Kalosian Berry tartes beyond what Tohru had ever considered possible and more.

_Who even thinks these things up?_

A Grepa tarte caught her eye and Tohru bit her lip. There were few things in the world that Tohru loved more than Grepa Berries. No one else liked them by themselves as they were unimaginably sour at first bite (in fact, Tohru was pretty sure she was the only person in the Empire that did), but it was common enough to see them added as flavouring to sweet food like this. It would be a luxury, but maybe just this once…

She looked at the price tag and balked. There was nowhere near that much money in her pocket. Apparently, Grepa tartes were something Elites were willing to pay through the nose for.

Reluctantly, she turning her gaze back to oggling the rest of the display. Several ladies were filling trays with their choice of pastries and breads, clearly with no need to worry about how much the bill would come to. The coins — no, pennies — in Tohru's pocket suddenly felt even more pathetic when she noticed that the people here were paying by card. Oh the fortunes that must languish in those bank accounts.

Despite herself, though, Tohru got her coins out and counted them, as if they might have multiplied since the last time she looked yesterday. Sadly not, but just enough to buy something from here. It would clear her out altogether, but she didn’t have time to look for a cheaper place.

When she looked up, she found one of the stall workers watching her with an eyebrow raised, and her hand snapped shut around the coins reflexively as she straightened her back. Looking behind him, Tohru noticed a Flareon curled up on a fire-proof cushion atop an upturned box, its fiery tufts of fur glowing on a low ebb in sleep. Even Elites turned their minds to the menial tasks of making and selling food, though she knew they would sooner call it an art.

"Can I help you?" The man asked, a genuine question evident in his rising intonation as if he wasn't sure why Tohru was there. She glanced again at the price of what she wanted.

"Just a plain bread roll, please," Tohru responded, proffering the money with some reluctance. Judging by the thick cotton of his white baker’s jacket, he definitely didn’t need it as much as she did. But Tohru stood her ground. Money and food would be less of an issue for her once she joined the Resistance anyway.

The man cast a skeptical eye over the spare change in Tohru's hand, his right eyebrow apparently fixed in a permanent arch on his forehead, before accepting the coins with another suspicious glance at Tohru and putting one of the rolls in a paper bag for her as if serving her somehow tarnished his business. Well, he could burn in hell with all his fancy baked goods for all she cared, and if she had anything to do with it then maybe he would one day. Taking the roll with a curt nod, she tucked it into her jacket pocket and stalked off.


	2. Chapter 2

It was just as well Tohru had bought the bread roll when she’d had the chance, even if it had cost her far more than it should have. After almost an hour of wandering around the poorer South-East Quarter of central Goldenrod, according to her map and the dilapidated high-rises, she hadn’t seen a single shop or market, and her appetite was starting to come back with a vengeance. She hadn’t even seen any people except for the odd elderly woman or man, walking hunched over a stick, which was probably because all of the fit-to-work commoners that lived here were out toiling away at whatever factory or office they were ‘employed’ in.

Tohru pulled out the map for the millionth time and squinted at the scribble as if it would suddenly jump out and tell her the exact location of the Resistance base. But all the roads around here looked the same, and the map was so simple that unless she was already on the right street, then there was no way of telling where she was in relation to it. She’d turned left off the main thoroughfare as it indicated, but maybe she’d got it wrong.

 _I should just go back to the Main Street and start again,_ she thought with a sigh. She shoved the useless map back into her pocket.

 _May as well eat this roll before I do that._ Skirting around a large dustbin that, from the smell of it, should have been emptied a few days ago, she came to an alley that was open at both ends in case she needed to leave in a hurry but shaded enough that it didn’t feel exposed. She checked her surroundings to make sure that she was alone and made her way down the narrow street, hopping over a few potholes where murky rainwater had gathered. Looking up, she saw that the buildings lining it had been built at different times, with mismatched brick- and tile-work dating from various eras that her Grandma would have been able to tell her more about. Newer buildings huddled right up against old ones, exterior walls shared so as not to waste space in leaving gaps between them. Tohru eyed a spot where two such buildings met. One protruded further into the alley than the other, creating a little corner that would make a perfect place to sit for a bite to eat. It had even managed to stay dry, being just far enough away from a nearby drainpipe that the runoff hadn’t reached it.

 _Finally._ Tohru hadn’t realised how tired her legs had become until they flooded with relief at having the weight taken off them. And then there was the case of her stomach, which asserted itself with an audible growl. Once sat on the tarmac with her back rested against the wall, Tohru wasted no time in pulling out the bread roll from her jacket pocket. Yes it had cost her way too much, but at least she had it. Still slightly warm, the smell had her mouth watering before she even took a bite. She sank her teeth into it, the crust crispy but the inside delightfully soft, and for the brief moment that she savoured the taste of the bread in her mouth, her stomach responded with an increased pang of hunger that was only partly sated when she swallowed. She bit off another chunk. And another.

 _This must be why the Elites pay so much. That stuck-up baker clearly knows what he’s doing._ It was nothing like she’d ever had back in Olivine, at home with her grandparents or from the market. She’s always steered clear of the more expensive stalls since she knew where what little money she had would go further, but this was seriously making her question the wisdom of doing that. Maybe this was what Grandma meant when she went on about quality over quantity.

She’d unwittingly finished off half the roll, which had barely been bigger than her hand in the first place, before she remembered that she would need to share some. Though the occasional kills that she had managed to make on their journey to Goldenrod had provided pretty decent meals and rations, the various encounters with wild Pokémon had still taken their toll and left her partner weak. One particularly close encounter with a flock of Psyduck on Route Thirty-Five would give Tohru nightmares for weeks. Such weird creatures.

Banishing that thought, Tohru stretched her right leg out in front of her and fumbled with the hidden pocket-within-a-pocket in her loose, worn-out jeans to pull out the only thing she would ever need such a pocket for.

_“Are you sure you want to go? Don’t you want to wait a bit longer?” Tohru’s grandmother took her by the hand, warm and gentle, her voice barely betraying the fear Tohru could see in her deep brown eyes._

_Tohru set her jaw. “No. I’ve waited long enough. I’m going tomorrow and that’s it.”_

_“Fine,” Grandma sighed. “At least you’ll have a Pokémon with you. But you won’t be able to take her into any of the cities, unless…”_

_Tohru waited while her grandmother stood and opened the wooden sliding door that led into hers and grandpa’s bedroom. Beckoning Tohru to follow, she skirted around the bed that took up most of the space in the tiny room._

_“Hold this mattress up for me.”_

_With a heave, they hauled the mattress up and Tohru held the end of it on her shoulder while grandma undid a little zip in the seam underneath and pulled out a little black pouch. Tohru placed the mattress back down and they returned to the kitchen table._

_“Take this with you.”_

_Crimson red on the top hemisphere and pearl white on the bottom with a little button in the middle. Common enough, but Tohru had never seen one this close before._

_A Poké Ball._

_“It was my Venomoth’s Ball before the Empire. Keep your Pokémon in it when you enter a city and whatever you do,_ don’t _draw any attention to yourself.”_

Scratched and dented from the years of use her grandma must have put it through, the weight of the Ball was becoming so familiar to her now and she marvelled at how useful it was to be able to keep her Pokémon with her all the time like this. Manipulating the Poké Ball with her fingers, she twirled it around so that the button in the middle was underneath her thumb and pressed, expanding the Ball to fill her hand.

"Out you come, then, Hyo," she said softly, and the Poké Ball reacted immediately. The red top flipped backwards, letting out a great mass of energy that shone with an irradiant light, causing Tohru to shield her eyes. The energy arced in the air and down, coalescing on the ground in front of her into the shape of a regal canine creature almost two meters in height and longer still from nose to tail. As the light faded, a face made up of two keen eyes framed by shorter orange fur and surrounded by a huge cream-coloured mane wasted no time in bringing a black button nose towards Tohru and sniffing the remains of the bread in her hand.

Tohru laughed and, despite the hunger she still felt, offered the rest of the roll to her Arcanine. Hyo wagged her bushy tail happily as she gently took the roll into her fanged mouth and jerked it back to swallow in one. She brought her long pink tongue out to lick her chops and gave Tohru a hopeful look.

"That's all we've got for now. I'll see about getting us some more later," Tohru said. Hyo displayed only the tiniest bit of disappointment and proceeded to give Tohru an affectionate lick on the cheek before lying down on the ground and resting her head on her front paws. Tohru cracked a smile to herself at how Hyo completely blocked up the alley.

She was still getting used to seeing Hyo as an Arcanine. It had been barely a week since that strange man had given them the Fire Stone when they’d spent a rainy night in the Burnt Tower just outside Ecruteak City. Tohru’s thoughts still went to him occasionally, with his unruly white hair making him look old but not a wrinkle on the papery skin of his face. And those grey eyes that seemed to look too deep… ‘Strange’ didn’t do any justice in describing him.

As for why he’d shared given Tohru such a rare and precious stone, she still had no idea. But she wouldn’t have to worry about that so long as she never saw him again, and she certainly had no plans to do that in a hurry.

But there were definite advantages to Hyo being an Arcanine now, so she wasn’t complaining. Her added size had kept all but the most foolhardy wild Pokémon at bay on the journey to Goldenrod. Plus there was the fact that she could ride her, which had halved the travel time. Hyo hadn’t been able to get her full speed up as they’d been travelling off road through the forest and mountains to avoid being seen, but it had still been _awesome_.

 _One day we’ll live in a world where we can run together freely_ , Tohru thought, feeling her determination crease her brow as she returned Hyo’s affection with a scratch behind the ears.

But for now, they didn’t. Part of her worried about someone seeing them, though they’d barely seen anyone all morning so they were probably safe. Pushing the idea from her mind, she turned around to lie back on Hyo's coal-coloured belly, feeling the comfort of the fire that she imagined lived inside.

There had been a time when Hyo had felt too hot to touch, and Tohru remembered almost burning herself the first time the baker’s poor Growlithe had taken a strip of dried meat from her hand. But over the time they'd spent together, she'd gradually got used to the Fire Pokémon's heat and now drew strength and comfort from it. She even found that she didn't mind the cold at night so much, though that was probably just because she'd been sleeping curled up with Hyo on the way here.

 _It must be almost midday by now. How long was I walking?_ Looking up from her position on the floor Tohru could see a strip of blue sky but no sun, so she couldn’t accurately work out what time it was. Instead, figuring that she could relax with Hyo for a bit before she carried on moving, she let her eyes wonder. The buildings she’d been leaning against towered above her, the older one to her right seven storeys and the newer one that narrowed the alley with its girth taller still. Both had been painted a once-bright yellow in a past effort to rejuvenate them, but it had lost to the elements and was peeling off now in more than a few places. The people living in this area had to make do with concrete buildings that had seen little maintenance since being thrown up cheaply and quickly during the Kanto colonial era, a time of rapid modernisation for Goldenrod and Olivine, though less so for the rest of Johto. According to Grandma, anyway.

Mind wondering further, her fingers wound their way into her pocket again, brushing against the only other piece of paper in there. The note that had started her on this journey.

The note from her mother, Ayano.

She took it out and held it up to eye level. Her eyes took in the message in the jotted handwriting, written quickly but just about legible. Not that she needed to read it again — she’d memorised its content weeks ago — but somehow looking at it helped her think. It was written in the same cipher as the map, and again Grandma had understood it immediately. She hadn’t been willing to share how, but Tohru hadn’t complained and it didn’t take a leap of the imagination to guess, given where the note had come from and the instructions it carried. So she’d put her mind to studying it before she left, and now it made (almost) complete sense to her.

Of course, it revealed no new secrets. But even if she had to go back and start again she would get there no matter how long it took. Because that’s where her mother was.

And she was finally going to see her again.

A strange mix of excitement and trepidation tightened her stomach and grew up her to chest and throat. It had been five years. At sixteen, that was almost a third of her life. Ayano might have changed, might not be how Tohru remembered her. There had been times where Tohru had considered herself forgotten, that her mother wouldn’t keep her promise to send for Tohru when she was old enough. After all, if she was going to ask Tohru to follow her later, why hadn’t she just taken her with her in the first place? Why had she abandoned her?

At that thought, her old anger that she mostly kept on a low burn threatened to reignite within her. It would be so easy to let it consume her, and it almost did. What kind of mother —

 _No. I can’t think like that now._ Rolling onto her side, eyes squeezed shut, she balled her fists into Hyo’s thick fur and shut that thought down. She’d had this conversation with herself too many times to count on the way here, and that was on top of the arguments with her grandparents before leaving. So she did what she’d been doing with her Grandpa every day since her mother left. Simple, yet effective.

She breathed.

Forcing herself to face the sky again, Hyo’s fur tickling her ears and warming her back, she breathed in for four counts and out for eight. It was difficult at first and her chest felt uncomfortably full when she inhaled and yet unwilling to let it go when she exhaled, and memories of her mother ran through her mind, those sharp features with long black hair tied back. Without thinking, Tohru’s fingers found her own pony tail and she remembered her mother carefully tying her hair back for her before their early morning training sessions, which usually ended with Tohru on her back or in some kind of head lock. But Grandpa had continued training her, and now she wanted to show her mother what she could do.

After a while she felt her heartbeat slow and found herself comfortable with having empty lungs for a few seconds between breaths. After longer still, she found herself breathing in time with Hyo, less slowly than before but more natural.

_I’m here for a reason._

It was as her Grandpa had always said. Only through calm can a person focus, and only through focus can a person achieve their goals.

Tohru would find her mother today. And who knew, perhaps her next step would be to contribute towards making the world a better place.

~*~

Tohru jolted awake when Hyo growled, a sound that vibrated through Tohru’s back to her very core. Adrenaline immediately filled her veins — Hyo would only growl like that with good reason. When had she fallen asleep? She made to get up, undoing the zip on her jacket to cool dow—

The sound of footsteps stopped her dead.

"That's an impressive Pokémon you've got there, especially for a commoner,” a voice called from the end of the alley way. There was humour in the voice, but it served as only a thin veil to the hard edge of threat. Tohru and Hyo immediately jumped to their feet to face the new-comers. Hyo growled again, hackles raised.

The woman who had spoken was walking towards Tohru with a man just a few steps behind. With neat, bob-cut hair under her cap, the woman’s squarish face was cut with a predatory smile, while something about the man’s face reminded Tohru of a Grimer. Both were dressed in black and grey uniforms with an orange "R" emblazoned across the chest, uniforms that Tohru would know anywhere.

The Rocket Guard.

A lead weight landed in Tohru's stomach and Hyo bared her teeth, letting out another low growl. This is not good. The woman simply smirked in response, perhaps noticing Tohru’s fear, then straightened her face.

“Either that Pokémon is much older than you are, or you used a Fire Stone to evolve it. You’re under arrest on suspicion of illegal possession of a Pokémon and theft.” She smiled again, looking like finding a commoner with a Pokémon like this had made her year. The woman unclipped a Poké Ball from her belt and enlarged it in her hand. Her partner behind her did likewise. “You have the option to come willingly, or we will use force.”

Tohru had no desire to find out what was in those Poké Balls. The guards had two each, and those were not odds that Tohru would bet against even if she and Hyo hadn’t just spent weeks on the road. Half a bread roll each couldn’t do much to recover their strength. They were in no fit state to fight.

“Hyo, use Roar!”

The roar tore from Hyo’s throat like the thunder from a storm directly overhead. Despite having heard it so many times before in similar situations, the sound still sent shivers of terror down Tohru’s spine. There was a feral part of her brain that, in that moment, truly believed Hyo to be a menacing beast that would rip her heart out if she didn’t immediately run for her life.

But she stood her ground, one hand fearfully yet stubbornly buried in Hyo’s mane. When she opened her eyes, she saw that the guards had covered their ears. Although they were cringing in panic as well, the distraction would be short-lived. Tohru and Hyo had to run. Now.

Tohru jumped onto Hyo’s back. Together they leapt over the heads of the now recovering guards and barrelled towards the end of the alley. Tohru didn’t look back, but she didn’t need to.

Behind them, the tell-tale hollow chimes of Poké Balls opening echoed off the walls. Just as they turned the corner, Tohru glimpsed a vicious-looking canine Pokémon already running after them, the bone-like protrusions on its coal-coloured face lowered to the ground as it gathered speed. A Houndour.

Tohru didn’t have time to see what the second Pokémon was.

As if sensing Tohru’s panic, Hyo pounded her paws harder on the tarmac and raced down the road. Wind that hadn’t been there before battered Tohru’s face and threatened to unseat her, and she had to lower herself right down close to Hyo’s back to shield herself from it. The sheer speed of an Arcanine was no match for a Houndour, and they soon left their pursuers in the dust.

 _Phew. That was way too close._ The weight unwound itself from Tohru’s stomach and she allowed herself to focus on the thrill of the ride, the increasingly familiar motions of her Arcanine beneath her.

The streets of the South East District twisted and turned, and soon Hyo was forced to slow down. Tohru glanced back, but there was no sign of the guards.

That was when she heard a squawk from above.

Tohru looked up, but not in time to see what was coming. Sharp pain stabbed her scalp and scratched through skin down to her skull. Tohru cried out in pain and shock and almost fell off of Hyo as she was pulled about by her hair. She flailed and tried to bat whatever it was away, but it held fast. Hyo had stopped running and Tohru heard her whimper and shift, perhaps trying to turn around to help, but the angle was wrong and there was nothing she could do. Something sharp jabbed around Tohru’s forehead, aiming for her eyes, and through gritted teeth Tohru seized a softly feathered head and pulled. Tohru tried to twist and break its neck, but it let go of her head and instead scratched at her wrist, forcing her to release it.

It squawked again and pulled back enough for Tohru to see it. Red wings and shaggy brown feathers around the head marked it out as a Spearow, flapping quickly to hover on the spot. Bad-tempered Pokémon at the best of times. Tohru gripped Hyo’s fur again as the Arcanine turned to face the feathered Pokémon, maw dripping flames.

She unleashed the Flamethrower attack, but the Spearow was already moving. The torrent of fire hit the wall behind, scorching it black, and the Spearow was coming back at Tohru’s face at full speed. Tohru ducked Aerial Ace attack just in time, and the Tiny Bird Pokémon’s momentum carried it past. Hyo began to turn again, but her size made her too slow at close quarters.

“Hyo, we need to go,” Tohru said, voice full of panic. Hyo didn’t need telling twice.

But just as they were about to run again, the Houndour appeared at the crossroads ahead and a voice called from behind.

“You can’t hide on a Pokémon like that, and now you’re surrounded. Come quietly and we can keep this clean.” Tohru turned to see the woman from before, face screwed into an almost-fanged smile and thumb hooked through a belt loop by her remaining Poké Ball. The Spearow flew back to the man and perched on his shoulder, squawking again in threat. So if the Houndour belonged to the female guard and Elites tended to train one type of Pokémon, that probably ruled out a Feraligatr being in the second Poké Ball. No bad thing for Tohru, but she still didn’t want to test her theory.

Tohru shot a snarl of her own at the guards and turned her back, ready to kick Hyo into motion and leap over the Houndour. Hyo could clear the smaller canine easily.

But the woman reacted too quickly.

“Houndour, Smog!” The woman called, and the Dark Pokémon opened its mouth wide to spit out the noxious, purple-tinged fumes.

“Hyo, be careful!” They were too close. The acrid smell filled Tohru’s nose and eyes with a pain like a thousand needles without her barely drawing a breath, and she lifted her shirt to cover her nose and mouth in an attempt to shield herself.

But Hyo had no such protection. She coughed and wretched as she inhaled the fumes. Soon she was shaking.

“Hyo!” Tohru dismounted, eyes streaming, panic and desperation taking over completely as the Smog dissipated and she saw the specks of froth already forming at Hyo’s mouth. Her Arcanine didn’t have much energy left as it was — it wouldn’t take long for the poison to finish her off.

And they were surrounded with no way out. They would have to fight, or at least create enough distraction to get away.

“Can you Flamethrower the Houndour, Hyo?” Tohru said, one hand gripping her Arcanine’s shoulder as she tried to draw confidence from the physical contact. But the usual reassurance she felt when she touched Hyo was completely absent, replaced by mortal fear.

And determination.

Hyo coughed and sputtered as she tried to muster up an attack. The Houndour approached, slow and self-assured in its victory, and the sound of footsteps from behind wrapped around Tohru’s insides like a cold iron hand. If Hyo really couldn’t attack…

“We’re adding assault of an officer’s Pokémon to your list of charges, girl,” the woman called, voice spiked with irritation. Did she really think that Tohru would just roll over and let them take her? Though she was fast running out of options. She could try and fight them herself, but four against one were not odds she would bet on.

“Come on, Hyo.” Seconds had passed, yet each one felt like nails scratching with aching slowness on slate, the space between footsteps a lifetime of torture. Tohru fisted Hyo’s fur and stood closer, trying to lend her what little assurance she could give, for all the good it would do them now. The guards were about ten paces away and the Houndour, with its gleaming teeth and smoking maw, less than two meters.

Hyo coughed again and Tohru’s heart caught in her throat. What if she died now?

Then with a roar of rage, another torrent of fire burst from Hyo’s jaws, hotter than any inferno. Tohru was forced to step back, arm over her face for protection. The Houndour disappeared in the inferno.

“No!” The woman shrieked behind Tohru, and she heard her running to close the gap between them. Tohru had to move quickly. With a flash, she recalled the now convulsing Hyo to her Poké Ball and jumped into a sprint, not stopping to see if the Houndour had survived the Flamethrower at point blank range. Though it was a Fire-type and Hyo was weakened, so probably. Tohru could only push the thought from her mind and hope she’d at least slowed them down.

"Don't think you can escape!" The woman shouted, but Tohru didn't care. She focussed on pumping her legs as fast as they would go, ignoring the sound of boots pounding tarmac behind her and the growing sense that there was no way out of this.

Because how could she get away when she didn’t know where the damned hideout was?

_Just. Lose. Them._

She made a hard right turn and hurtled down yet another deserted street. The shouts and the sound of boots running followed. She leapt over a puddle. Careened left at the end of the road. Followed the next one round to the right. As she ran, she looked out for places to hide, but with the guards so close behind there was no way she could hide without them seeing where she went. And all the while, the knowledge that Hyo’s life was slowly ebbing away gnawed persistently at her consciousness.

Leaving the city wasn’t an option, even assuming she could sustain this sprint and open up a lead. Both gates to the North and South were guarded, and the city was well-fortified with high, unbroken walls to the north, east and south. And there was no way she was swimming out through the port. Stowing away on a boat might be an option, again if she could get that far, but the idea of being on a hunk of metal surrounded by depthless water was almost less appealing than being in the hands of the Guard. Almost.

Then there was the fact that her mother had called her here. And that Hyo needed immediate medical attention. She had to stay in the city, so the only thing she could do was run and find somewhere to hide. The Resistance hideout would have to wait.

Tohru turned another corner and risked a glance back but immediately wished she hadn’t. Not only had the guards narrowed the gap between her and them to less than ten metres, but the Houndour and Spearow were also back in action and moving at speed just ahead of their uniformed trainers.

_Crap. How am I going to outrun them?_

Tohru looked around to check her bearings as she pumped her legs harder, hoping to at least get an idea of which way she was headed. Perhaps if she could find the main thoroughfare again, she could lose them in the crowds. But as she ran she realised that, in her panic, she hadn’t been keeping track of where she was or which direction she was going in.

She was lost.

How could this be happening?! There was no way she could lose them if she didn’t even know which direction she was going in!

Dread and helplessness flooded through Tohru like a riptide of ice water come to pull her down and drown her. There was no way out. Hyo was dying. She may as well just give up and surrender…

_No! Not now that I’m so close to finally seeing mum again._

With a burst of speed and clarity, Tohru pushed her legs harder and took in her environment. Just because she was disorientated, didn’t mean she couldn’t use whatever there was to her advantage. If she could just lose them, then she could find a way to heal Hyo.

"Houndour, Ember her legs!" the woman called.

Tohru heard the command just in time to dart to the side, though the smell of burning fabric alerted her to a singed ankle on her jeans. No matter. She looked ahead and noticed two right turns in quick succession — hopefully one of them wasn’t a dead end. Hurtling past the first, she darted down the second. The guards followed.

Another empty road, this time lined with older and smaller buildings made of wood, in the traditional style. Usually built in small blocks laid out in a grid pattern, or at least the ones back in Olivine were. Tohru just hoped that these were the same.

There!

She darted down another right turn, this one a cobbled alley so narrow that there wasn’t even room for two people to stand shoulder to shoulder. Tohru realised with sudden panic that if the guards had predicted her plan, then one of them could easily show up at the other end and she’d be completely trapped. The uneven floor threatened to send her crashing down and she was forced to keep a close eye on her footing rather than ahead.

“There she is!” The man’s voice, from behind. A growl and a squawk and a feminine shout told Tohru all she needed to know.

She pivoted to face the guards. The man was in front. He had a moment for surprise to register on his saggy face before Tohru reached him, which she used to her advantage. He was a head taller than her, but she caught him with both hands around the back of the neck and yanked down, bringing his head to her chest. He grabbed Tohru’s arms, but she held fast and brought her knee up into his face. He grunted in pain and tried to catch Tohru’s leg under his arm, but she threw him to the side. She wasn’t about to slow down with her life on the line, no matter how much her body was crying out for rest.

The woman came up behind and pulled the man back so that she could get to Tohru. The Houndour was at her heels but Tohru didn’t have time to deal with it. On light feet, she took a few small steps back. The woman came at her with a fist aimed for the temple. Tohru caught it in one hand and punched the woman in the gut with the other. The Houndour chose that moment to come at Tohru’s leg, fangs blazing, and she was forced to release the guard. She kicked the canine in the jaw, knocking it back into its trainer. The fire caught the woman in the leg and singed her standard-issue trousers. Tohru turned and ran.

_That should slow them down. But where’s that Spearow?_

She turned right at the end of the alley, onto a wider road. The angry voices of the guards called from behind, but there was no Spearow. She took a left at the end of the road, planning to go back the way she’d come so that the Houndour might have difficulty picking up the scent of which way she’d gone. But as she looked over her shoulder when she hit the road from before, she saw the guards and the Houndour running out of the mouth of the alley they’d fought in and she knew they’d seen her. So much for that idea.

And still no Spearow.

Tohru’s legs screamed for some respite, but she pushed harder. She needed keep up this larger gap between her and the guards.

She took lefts and rights at random, down streets lined with tower blocks and alleys that ran between older buildings. But with that Houndour and its sense of smell leading the way, the guards were never far behind. And if they caught her, Tohru knew that they would put her to death. The life of one commoner in the Empire was worth nothing.

Suddenly, she came out onto a wider road lined with boarded up shops and a few stalls interspersed with people selling food and wares more of the kind that Tohru was used to seeing, unlike the fancy shops on the main thoroughfare. There were even a few people and carts passing by. Tohru dashed left. Perhaps she could use the few people that there were for cover. The guards burst out onto the road behind her, calling out for someone to stop her but no one did. She ran and dodged around an old woman hunched walking stick with an apology, and heard the lady’s loud curses a few seconds later when the guards knocked her over. Of course the guards wouldn’t think twice about running into an old woman if she was a commoner. They didn’t care about anyone except for the Elites.

Teeth gritted, Tohru looked ahead — there’d be plenty of time to think about hating the guard later when or if she got out of this mess. The road was long and straight, unusual for this part of the city where most of the old grid had been bombed and then rebuilt, or knocked down in favour of mass accommodation. She could see mountains rising above the city where the road ended in the distance. And the only mountains near Goldenrod were in the…

_East._

_So I’ve been heading south. The base is supposed to be on a covered market road, but maybe…_

A gust of wind from above broke her train of thought. She shot her arms up to protect her head just in time for sharp talons to rip through her sleeves and flesh. It was all she could do to keep moving as she flung her arm to the side in an attempt to get rid of the cursed Spearow.

It worked. Before the bird could right itself, it crashed into an unfortunate passerby in a cacophony of squawks and shouted curses, but the Houndour had used Tohru’s distraction to catch up, with the guards not far behind. It snarled as it opened its jaw for another Ember attack, but Tohru jumped out of the way just in time.

There was a junction just ahead, with people crossing north to south. That must be the main shopping street for the South-East Quarter. And everyone that worked nearby was out for lunch. It wasn’t covered, but she knew she couldn’t be far now.

A Taurus-drawn cart with a low-ranking Elite in the driving seat pulled out through the crowd just as Tohru reached the intersection. The guards and the Houndour were less than five paces behind her. Seeing her chance, Tohru sped up and launched herself in front of the Tauros. The Wild Bull Pokémon reared up in anger, tipping the cart and its goods backwards and eliciting screams from the poor people behind.

Once past, Tohru shot a glance back to see the Tauros crash back down and knock the female guard to the ground. She lay on the street, struggling to get up as the Tauros’ handler hurriedly recalled his Pokémon with profuse apologies. Through the gathering crowd, Tohru met the dark eyes in woman’s square face for a brief second and saw there a rage and hate that almost gutted Tohru then and there. And she knew in this moment that, no matter where she ran or where she hid, these people would not forget her.

 _No time to think about that now_. She turned right and bolted through the throng of people. It wasn’t as busy as the main thoroughfare had been that morning, but there were enough people that Tohru had to weave between them. And if that slowed her down, then it would also slow down the guard that was still after her, who apparently hadn’t stopped to help his colleague. What a bastard. He called out for someone to stop her, but perhaps because the people were too stunned by the spectacle to react quickly enough or they had seen this kind of thing enough to know not to step in, no one did. Sheer exhaustion threatened to bring Tohru to a stop, but fear for her life and Hyo’s — combined with the fact that she knew she was _almost there_ — kept her going.

She scanned the dilapidated shops ahead with their less-than-fresh fruit and vegetables, looking for the turning she needed. If it wasn’t along here, then she was doomed.

When it came up, she almost ran past it.

She doubled back a few steps and lost precious distance against the guard on her tail, but the crowd had closed in around him where it had opened up for Tohru and he was further back than she had thought.

 _These people definitely know what they’re doing_. And she didn’t mean the guards.

The road was covered with a prism glass roof that had yellowed and dusted with age long ago — reminiscent of a bygone era where someone had thought that undercover shopping streets were the way forward. Apparently they hadn’t been, and this road was almost as deserted as the streets where the guards had found Tohru and Hyo. But that didn’t matter, because she could already see where she needed to be and the guard hadn’t even rounded the corner after her yet.

There, just a few metres ahead, was a shop with an array of old bikes chained up outside with price cards on them handwritten in red. The shop that had given the last Johto Champion a bike as she travelled through the region.

Tohru rounded the haphazard display and darted down the alley at the side of the shop, but not quick enough to avoid being seen by the guard as he came around the corner at the end of the road.

There was no going back now.

She scanned the alley. The ochre tiles on the walls and red bricks on the road had both faded to almost grey, the grime and dust coating them untouched for decades. A line of wooden crates to the right was the only sign this alley ever saw any human activity.

But there were no doors in any of the walls. And she was sure this was the way she'd been told to come in.

She moved quickly down past some crates on the floor that came up to her chest, checking the bike shop wall for any cracks that might indicate a secret door.

Then she saw it. A wooden trap door on the floor between the crates. But with seconds before the guard and his Spearow would come around the corner and see her, she had no time to open it. She looked about. Should she run? Would the crates provide enough cover to hide? Surely he'd see her when he went past. There was a gap behind one of the crates. If she could just squeeze in there...

With a glance back down the alley, Tohru took her chances among the crates and crouched down on top of the trap door. By the wall there was a bit of a gap, but not big enough for her to fit in. The space between the crates was just over half a meter, but not by much. Tohru hunkered down with her knees to her chest and back to the wall, willing herself invisible. This was a crap idea. If he walked past he would see her and the trap door and she would have got herself caught and led the Guard to the hideout.

Boots pounded the bricks.

He paused, Spearow hovering at his shoulder, and looked straight at Tohru's not-really-a hiding place. Her heart stopped. But as she stared up at his face like a cornered Nidoran might look at its predator just as it sank its teeth in for the kill, somehow his eyes glided over her. Following his gaze, it seemed that he was looking at the wall just above her head. He muttered something to himself and continued running. His Spearow followed.

_What?_

Once she could no longer hear the guard’s footsteps or frustrated mumbling, Tohru stuck her head out and saw them rounding a corner further down the alley. Relief washed over her in a cascade that had finally pulled her over the edge and carried her to calmer waters, and she released the breath that she hadn’t even realised she’d been holding.

By some force of magic, she’d got away. She was free.

She would see her mother again.

But Hyo still needed urgent medical attention. Her hand moved automatically to her pocket where her Arcanine lay poisoned in her Poké Ball. What if she’d already died? What happened to a Pokémon if it died in its Ball? She’d heard that only living Pokémon could be recalled, so did that mean that they would come out automatically? Which would mean that Hyo was still alive? Or did the body just stay in there until released and then not go back in?

Either way, she didn’t want to find out. So she turned her attention to the trap door. Flush to the ground with no groves or handle to pull it up, there didn’t seem to be an obvious way in from the outside. She’d stood on it and it hadn’t budged. So she’d just have to do as her mother’s note had told her. She leant forward so that her nose almost touched the smooth wood. Giving a couple of knocks because she felt like she should, she then spoke, voice strangely loud in the silent alley.

“I know Nishio Ayano.” Apparently that would be enough to get her in.

But nothing happened. Seconds stretched out, and Tohru sat crouched against the door. _Maybe they didn’t hear me?_

But just as she was about to knock again, the trapdoor jolted beneath her. Tohru took her weight off it and scrambled around to the side facing out into the alley where it was opening. She tried to keep herself level with the crates, but her back felt horribly exposed as if someone would come out of the wall on the other side with a knife and slide it in between her ribs from behind, accurate and deadly. A glance revealed no one there, but that didn’t make her feel better.

She forced her eyes down to watch the crack open between the door and its wooden frame. But it was dark inside and she saw nothing except for the top of a steel ladder.

When it had opened just enough for a person to get through, it stopped. No voice called for her to enter, and Torhu hesitated. What was she meant to do?

But the itch of imagined eyes watching her from behind propelled her forward. Trying to ignore the twist in her stomach that told her she could be jumping out of the oven straight into the fire, she swung round and scrambled down into the darkness.


End file.
